


a careless man's careful daughter

by duelistkingdom



Series: nanonwrimo 2020: 100k challenge [9]
Category: Yu-Gi-Oh! - All Media Types, Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Monsters (Anime & Manga)
Genre: Based on a Taylor Swift Song, F/M, arguably aged up characters, based on ''mine'' by taylor swift, can you believe it? they're gonna make it now, duel monsters is just a popular card game au, everyone is in their twenties i guess, written in honor of mai's birthday
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-21
Updated: 2020-11-21
Packaged: 2021-03-09 21:07:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,036
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27652483
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/duelistkingdom/pseuds/duelistkingdom
Summary: mai's parents divorced when she was young. she meets jonouchi, a sweet man working part time waiting tables to put himself through college. he understands her like no one else.
Relationships: Jounouchi Katsuya | Joey Wheeler/Kujaku Mai | Mai Valentine, Polarshipping
Series: nanonwrimo 2020: 100k challenge [9]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1995451
Kudos: 4





	a careless man's careful daughter

Mai Kujaku had never really believed in love. She had no reason to, really. All she’d ever seen of love was that it broke and ended and she was done with it. In fact, Mai often wondered why anyone would bother with love if it never lasts. That was, of course, until she just happened to stumble across one Katsuya Jonouchi, a university student that was working part time waiting tables specifically with the intention of making his own way in life. He’d left a small town with the intention of making it big and never looked back. She’d made the mistake of letting him start a conversation with her and eventually she found herself part of his study group. It was alright, she supposed. There was no risk of falling if they just remained friends.

He already knew up front that she was a flight risk and Mai preferred it that way. He knew that Mai was not going to fall in love. Unfortunately for Mai, love did not decide when someone fell. Love came in swinging and she found herself wanting to be around Jonouchi more and more. He dragged her in and she found herself spending the night at his place one night. From there, everything just seemed to click together just a little too fast. “Can you believe it,” Mai asked one day while they were laying on the couch.

“Believe what?”

Of course Mai didn’t really have an answer for his question right back at her. She could see it: the exact moment he’d dragged her into believing in love again. “I mean, do you remember how this all started,” Mai said, trying her best to explain herself. “We were sitting right by the water and you just... you put your arm around me for the first time.”

Jonouchi smiled at the memory. Of course he remembered that. It had been the bravest thing he’d ever done, taking a risk like that. He knew that Mai could’ve easily told him go fuck himself and ruined the best friendship he’d ever had. Except... she didn’t. She didn’t tell him to go fuck himself. “Of course I remember that,” he said softly. “It was one of the best days of my life.”

It was just one of those things, Mai supposed. Jonouchi had decided to show her around Domino City and told her all about the risk he took by coming here for school. He’d lived in Domino for far longer than she had and she realized that he made her want to put down roots for once. She’d always just moved on when she got bored of a place and yet... nothing about Domino was boring. She realized that Domino had its hooks in her when his friends had become her friends. She’d reflected a lot on that date that he took her on and how it’d been so brave of him to be willingly to place his feelings out there.

Really, Jonouchi never shied away from his feelings. He claimed his best friend Yugi had taught him that there was no shame in expressing his feelings and well, Mai found herself starting to believe that. None of his friends ever judged her for any of her emotions, really. When she was scared, when she was upset, when she was nervous... none of them seemed like shameful emotions anymore. She felt lighter knowing that she was in a judgement free zone. In many ways, she would secretly describe it as Jonouchi had made a rebel out of a careless man’s careful daughter.

She had spent so long carefully guarding her emotions that she had thought were bad or even wrong to have. Instead, now, she told everything to Jonouchi and his friends. When she felt blue, she knew she could dial up Anzu and his sister, Shizuka, for a girl’s night of complaining over wine and watching TV together. When she felt anxious, she could call Yugi and Atem and talk with them about her fears about the future. When she was angry, she could call Honda and they’d go to the gym to punch some punching bags together. It was absolutely strange to not just have this relationship with Jonouchi, but a relationship with everyone else as a result. In many ways, she believed that Jonouchi was the best thing that’s ever been hers.

Flash forward months later and Mai was properly integrated into Domino. She’d found a new casino job and had an apartment of her own. As far as she was concerned, this was a sign that she was willing to take on the world with Jonouchi. They were going to take on everything together, actually. And she now had a drawer of her things at his place. For once, she let all her walls come crumbling right down and let him in. He’d learned all her secrets and figured out why she was guarded. Even still, Mai sometimes had doubts still. How could she believe anything this good would ever last when she had no proof it would?

She couldn’t understand how Jonouchi maintained faith the way he did. There was really no other way of putting it: Jonouchi had faith in them. “How can you be so certain that we just... won’t make our parents mistakes,” Mai had asked one day, on the verge of tears. “I just... sometimes I think about how both of us have divorced parents and both of us know that relationships can end. How can you be so sure?”

“But Mai, that's our parents. That's not us,” Jonouchi said fiercely, seemingly full of faith that Mai couldn’t possibly begin to understand. That was the thing about Jonouchi: he always seemed to have faith even when he had no reason to have faith. And Mai... well, she liked that about him. “I swear to you, I'll never make the mistakes my father made and I'll trust that you'll never make your parents mistakes.”

It didn’t matter to Jonouchi that they had bills to pay and had nothing figured out. And yet, Mai admired that so much. Some days it was so hard for her to keep faith, though. And as nice as Jonouchi’s reassurances were, they weren’t always helpful. So instead on those days, she focused on everything that went right with their relationship. What she thought about was all the times Jonouchi showed her new places in Domino and laughing with their friends. She thought about the inherent bravery in the very first time he put his arm around her and how easily he had made a rebel out of a careless man’s careful daughter. In many ways, the memories were exactly what she needed more than words sometimes.

What she needed was to hold on to every single good memory and hold them tight to her chest. How, exactly a year after their first date, she’d allowed herself to believe for the first time that love could actually last and willingly opened herself to saying “I love you” to him. She’d been so excited when he had said it back and admitted that he wanted to say it first. He’d claimed the only reason he hadn’t was because he didn’t want to make her feel pressured into saying something she didn’t mean. In that moment, she felt safer than she’d ever thought possible.

Mai had assumed that meant that they now were good forever. She’d never had a long term relationship before and so one night, when they got into a fight, she had no blueprint for how an argument was supposed to go in a relationship. She’d lost tracked of the thread of what started the argument hours ago and by 2:30 am, she was fed up. It felt like everything was slipping right out of her hands and she couldn’t take it anymore. As much as she wanted to fix this, she wasn’t sure _how_ to. Her parents had offered no blueprint because when they fought, it never resolved. And it kept coming back up every single fight and she had a sudden wave of anxiety taking over. Was this how it started?

Was this how her parents fell apart too? Did they once love each like she and Jonouchi do? Suddenly she was crying and she ran out of the apartment, desperate to prevent Jonouchi from breaking things off. She hadn’t realized it was raining and in all honesty, she didn’t care. She didn’t care as long as some distance was put between her and the problem. No, that wasn’t fair. Jonouchi wasn’t the problem here. She was. She was such a mess that she wasn’t sure why Jonouchi continued to bother with her at all. As far as she could tell, he wasn’t letting his issues bog him down. He did everything right and she... she just kept screwing up. Even now, she’d ruined the one good thing that she’d ever had. She was suddenly very grateful for the rain because if nothing else, strangers wouldn’t ask about why she was crying.

To her great surprise, Jonouchi had followed her out into the street. She could barely make out the details of his face in the streetlight and that made it hard to read his expression. All she could do was brace herself for the inevitable goodbye because that was all she’d ever known. “I know, it’s my fault,” she said quickly, desperate to soften the blow. “I just... don’t know when to stop picking, okay?”

Jonouchi had taken her hand and she felt a pounding in her chest. She’d never dealt with a break up before and she didn’t know how to deal with it. She’d never let anyone get in this deep with her and now Jonouchi had wormed his way in to her heart. “I know this,” he said and he sounded a little impatient. “But really, it’s not just your fault. I should’ve made an attempt to better see your side. I’m sorry that I failed you there.”

Her eyes went wide. “Wha – what are you talking about,” she managed to stumble out through her haze of confusion. Wasn’t he breaking up with her? Wasn’t that what this was? “I was totally unreasonable! God, I... I was a horrendous bitch to you when you were just trying to be helpful. I.. I don’t even know why you would bother with me.”

To this, Jonouchi responds by moving to cup her cheeks and his features came into sharp relief. Mai could actually see the wide eyed concern on his face. “Mai, I’ll never leave you alone,” he said softly, so full of love that Mai almost sobbed. Out of all the things he could’ve said, this was not what she was expecting. In fact... she was starting to suspect that this wasn’t the break-up she thought it was. “I remember how we felt on our first date, remember? I took you around Domino and we wound up sitting by the water and I looked over at you and I just... knew then that I would be so lucky to call you my girlfriend. Every time I look at you, it’s like the first time. I know that your parents suck, but god... I fell in love with a careless man’s careful daughter and she is the best thing that’s ever been mine.”

Mai could only respond with a soft whisper of his name and his lips were against hers in the pouring rain. She’d never told him how she often felt like he’d made a rebel out of a careless man’s careful daughter and yet here he was, completely on the same wavelength as her. “You are the best thing that’s ever been mine,” she said softly as she wrapped her arms around his neck and pulled him closer. There was a future she could look forward to with Jonouchi. She was his and he was hers, it was as simple as that. He took her hand to walk her back to their apartment and once again, she felt that surge of love and protection only he could provide. She could believe they were going to make it.

She could see it now.


End file.
